Talk about making a good first impression.
In his first meet as a Colorado Mesa University Maverick, Redshirt-freshman Ammar Hassan broke all kinds of records at the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Swimming and Diving Championships.
Hassan came into to CMU, after competing in the 2017 FINA World Championship for his native country of Egypt, and completely tore the RMAC Championships to shred. The diver ended up a breaking six-year-old record mark by scoring 565.50 points, which set the record for NCAA Division II. Hassan won both the three-meter and one-meter events while breaking the CMU school record for the one-meter event.
All these accomplishments allowed him to earn RMAC Diver of the Meet.
“We knew what his potential was,” Head swim coach Geoff Hanson said. “It came a little bit out of nowhere because he didn’t join us until a little bit later in the year.”
Sage D’Ambrosia, who held the former record in the one-meter event, finished third with a score of 514.20 points. The senior diver was the national leader coming into the conference championship and earned RMAC Diver of the Year for the outstanding year he demonstrated during the last four months.
D’Ambrosia was outed by fellow CMU diver Noah Macomber, who earned second place honors with a final score of 530.20 points.
Overall, the Mavericks took third in men’s and second in women’s after four days of exciting competition.
For the men, Sky Hirsch set NCAA consideration times in the 50-free after taking eighth with a time of 20.63 seconds. Chris Radomski placed tenth overall in the same event with a time of 20.76.
Both Hirsch and Radomski, along with Morgan Bean and Saif Ezzat Sayed, helped the Mavericks place second in the 200-yard free relay event.
On the same day in the men’s 200 freestyle, four of the top eight finishers were from CMU. Josh Bedford led the quartet with a third-place finish with a 1:38.31. Jerry Veneris, Jason Hicks and Landon Ellis followed suit by also setting “B” cut times in the same event.
On the women’s side, Brittany Dixon came out on top to earn the RMAC title in the three-meter diving event after taking third in the same event last season. Dixon would go on to earn RMAC Diver of the Year and Diver of the Meet honors.
For swimming, it was one of the closest meets in RMAC Championship history. The CMU women’s team lost by only six total points in the combined scores after getting edged out by California Baptist.
“It was a little bit bittersweet at the end,” coach Hanson said.” We were all thinking about what could’ve been…but I couldn’t be happier with our women, with how they swam.”
School records were set in all four nights for the women, which was highlighted by the 200-yard medley relay on the first night. The Mavericks set the school record while taking third overall in the event.
It was a heartbreaking loss for the women but was still considered the best team performance in program history.
The Mavericks will now await the selections for the NCAA Division II National Championship Qualifier which will take place on March.14
